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Don't let your friend scare you away from doing what you know is right for your book. Sure, it makes it more challenging to keep the audience's sympathies when the main characters do unlikable thi...
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#3: Attribution notice added
by
System
·
2019-12-08T07:21:56Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/31508 License name: CC BY-SA 3.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision
by
Chris Sunami
·
2019-12-08T07:21:56Z (almost 5 years ago)
Don't let your friend scare you away from doing what you know is right for your book. Sure, it makes it more challenging to keep the audience's sympathies when the main characters do unlikable things, but that's where your skill comes in as a writer. Nabakov's narrator in _Lolita_ is a monstrous child abuser. The most compelling character in Thomas Harris' _Silence of the Lambs_ is a cannibalistic killer. C.D. Payne's narrator in _Youth in Revolt_ is a relentlessly selfish and self-sabotaging amoralist who cannot find a situation he is unable to make worse. It didn't lessen the popularity of any of those best-sellers. We all do wrong things in life, things we regret. If you can help us empathize with the character, see things from his point of view, understand his choices, and watch him experience realistic consequences, then we'll be compelled by his story, not repelled. Nothing is truly "unforgivable" _in fiction_ except bad writing.
#1: Imported from external source
by
System
·
2017-11-17T15:00:17Z (almost 7 years ago)
Original score: 4